How to Find a Stud by Tapping on the Wall

Access an area of the wall where you wish to locate a wall stud.

Tap the wall gently at approximately 1-inch intervals, working in a horizontal direction. In the open space between wall studs, the sound is distinctly hollow. As you begin to approach a wall stud, the sound becomes more solid sounding. You can work back and forth to narrow down the point where the hammer seems to be striking the most solid point. When you believe you have the approximate location of a wall stud, mark the wall surface lightly with a pencil.

Locate the actual wall stud location by gently driving the tip of a finish nail into the wall at the mark you placed in step 2. Only tap the nail into the wall board to penetrate the drywall and test whether you've located a wall stud. If the nail passes through the drywall into empty space, remove the nail and try again approximately 1/2 inch horizontally to either side until you hit wood. Mark the wall stud location on the wall surface with a pencil.

Determine the center line of the wall stud. A wall stud is 1 1/2-inch wide, and you want to determine the center line to make any attachment to the strongest position. From the mark placed on the wall in step 3, penetrate the wall surface again with the finish nail, moving in 1/8- to 1/4-inch increments to define the wall stud edge on both sides. When the nail penetrates into empty space, mark that point as the stud edge on that side and repeat to mark the other edge. Measure the midpoint between the two edges as the stud center line.

Measure 16-inch horizontal increments from the stud center line defined in step 4 to locate other studs in the same wall, as necessary.